This truly is a miracle; two heavily damaged aircraft. The pilots would have been
justified in "punching out" but instead, they chose to bring the jets in. This
endangered their lives but saved the taxpayers about 80 million dollars. What is
especially intriguing is in picture 01, notice the radome, radar and all of the
avionics equipment, everything, in front is gone. This created several problems for
the pilot: aerodynamics, eventual loss of hydraulics due to loss of fluid, navigation,
and probably the most amazing, as the pieces fell away, some debris had to be
ingested by the engines (F.O.D.) and he still was able to bring it home!
The story behind them is: Two F/A-18 Hornets from Top Gun were dogfighting
and made a head on pass, just a bit too close. One got home with part of the left
wing and left vertical fin and rudder missing, while the other jet is missing everything
forward of the cockpit pressure bulkhead - and is a flying convertible because the
canopy is shattered too. These guys are lucky. It shows how rugged these aircraft
are...Also shows how good our pilots are.
justified in "punching out" but instead, they chose to bring the jets in. This
endangered their lives but saved the taxpayers about 80 million dollars. What is
especially intriguing is in picture 01, notice the radome, radar and all of the
avionics equipment, everything, in front is gone. This created several problems for
the pilot: aerodynamics, eventual loss of hydraulics due to loss of fluid, navigation,
and probably the most amazing, as the pieces fell away, some debris had to be
ingested by the engines (F.O.D.) and he still was able to bring it home!
The story behind them is: Two F/A-18 Hornets from Top Gun were dogfighting
and made a head on pass, just a bit too close. One got home with part of the left
wing and left vertical fin and rudder missing, while the other jet is missing everything
forward of the cockpit pressure bulkhead - and is a flying convertible because the
canopy is shattered too. These guys are lucky. It shows how rugged these aircraft
are...Also shows how good our pilots are.